1. Field of the Invention
The disclosure generally relates a method and apparatus for an automated competency assessment system and a method thereof. More particularly the present invention relates to an automated system for talent acquisition in an enterprise to identify talented candidates who meet the qualification standards specified by enterprise using a secured and light weight method of providing content including questions and responses in a distributed architecture.
2. Description of Related Art
For many years standardized testing has been common method of assessing examinees for the purpose of education, job placements, skill evaluation etc. Due to cost and complexity of tests, computer based testing emerged as a superior method for providing standardized tests but administration of test and evaluation of test results dynamically at a large scale still pose variety of problems like redundancy of questions and lack of harmonization, analytics and scale up.
The need to effectively test and analyze the large pools of candidates for the purpose of talent acquisition or educational assessment has also been long recognized. With increasingly sophisticated workforces of correspondingly increasing accumulated value, the process of testing, analyzing and recruiting a workforce, with effective real-time analytics, can preserve and deliver substantial value to organizations, including employer enterprises and placement agencies.
Several inventions have been made in this domain some of them known to us are described below:
U.S. Pat. No. 7,437,309 describes a computer based human capital management system that collects information from any combination of position applicants, employees, and reserve pool talent reflective of the position skills, performance, and requirements thereof. In particular, the invention discloses a method for implementing a talent management system, executed on a computer system, providing for the collection and qualification of performance capability information of workforce candidates. The invention however relies on the information collected from the candidates and fails to present a system for secure administration of real-time assessment of candidates in a scalable way.
US Patent Application 20070185757 describe a method for performing Talent Relationship Management (TRM) of candidates. It uses target groups formed for specified purposes from candidates constituting a talent pool. In particular the invention discloses a method of identifying potentially suitable candidates based on stored and organized information sources for filling a vacancy in an organization. In one embodiment, this patent application proposes TRM in distributed computing environments. In another embodiment, it discloses a method that checks skill level and specialty, experience, geographical location of candidate, candidate's aptitude and interests. However, the invention fails to present a system for secure administration of real-time assessment of candidates at several locations in a scalable way.
An automated process for recruiting technicians and pre-certifying them for a job position in distributed over a number of different geographical locations e.g., franchises is disclosed in US Patent Application 20070192172. The process as described in the patent application is controlled from a main office or central station, at a computer or computer server that is connected with a global computer network such as the Internet. However, the invention fails to disclose a system that maintains security of process and transfer of data. The invention also fails to propose a method of assessment where no two candidates are given tests with same questions and yet the questions are of standardized difficulty level and also does not disclose a real-time analytics of the performance of the candidates.
US Patent Application 20020156674 describes a recruiting system and method for providing job offer information via a server connected to a network. is the invention proposes a skill information database for storing skill information concerning skilled people requiring jobs; and an aptitude level determiner for determining an aptitude level for a skill required for each job. The invention fails to disclose a method of secure and scalable test administration.
All the above-mentioned prior-arts fail to disclose a secure and scalable solution to automate the application of competency assessment by providing appropriate level of security to the process and data transfer. The prior art discussed above also fails to attempt the requirements of exclusivity and standardization of the assessment, wherein no two candidates are given tests with same questions and yet the question are of standardized difficulty level. There is also a “long felt need” to solve the vacuum of powerful and real-time analytics in this domain of knowledge assessment systems.
In order to solve the above problems this invention proposes an automated system for competency assessment to identify talented candidates, wherein the system is architected as a scalable, secure and light weight system, designed to operate over a distributed architecture, and provides secure content, including questions and responses, wherein the distinctiveness of the test is maintained and the analysis of the test results is supported at a near real time by powerful analytics engine.
Therefore, there is a need for a method and apparatus for an automated competency assessment tool.